


Emotion Detector

by IreneADonovan



Series: Rush and Beer [7]
Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies)
Genre: Gen, M/M, Road Trip, Rush (the band), dadneto, post-XMA
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-21
Updated: 2018-03-21
Packaged: 2019-04-05 12:11:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14044023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IreneADonovan/pseuds/IreneADonovan
Summary: A little more father/son interaction, post-XMA...





	Emotion Detector

Peter was bored, bored, bored, bored, bored. He was stuck in a car going at a glacial snail's pace, he was out of books, and there was nothing but corn, wheat, and occasional clumps of trees for as far as he could see. “Why the heck did you drag us out to Bumfuck, Egypt?”

His dad looked irritated, but that was his default setting. “We're in Iowa.”

“Bumfuck, Iowa,” Peter amended.

His dad let it pass. “We're on our way to a town called Tama. There's a girl there named Libby Phillips who can sense emotions. And you're supposed to be reading Charles' notes.”

“I got tired of trying to decipher his handwriting,”

His dad smiled, called him on it. “Charles has perfect handwriting.”

“You think everything about him is perfect.” Those two were so head-over-heels.

“Not everything,” his dad said tightly, and Peter knew he'd crossed over one of his dad's invisible lines. “He's still hopelessly naïve.”

Peter eyed him warily. Sometimes he forgot his dad was fucking Magneto. The guy who'd tried to unmake the world, and who would have succeeded had he not had a change of heart.

Then his dad grinned that too-toothy grin of his, and Peter knew he'd been had. “And his nose is too big.” The grin faded to a soft smile. “But his lips are indeed perfect.”

“TMI, dude.” Peter really didn't want to think about what the Professor was doing to his dad with those lips. “Can I play some music?”

His dad sighed. “If you must.”

“I did bring some Rush.”

His dad nodded. “Play that, then.”

Peter snagged his boombox from the back seat, dug through his backpack for his tape of Signals, got it playing.

It was cued up to the second side, and “The Weapon” began, instruments building gradually, followed by Geddy Lee's distinctive voice.

His dad listened in silence, but even before the end of the first verse, Peter detected a new vibration in the car's metal frame. By the end of the first chorus, his dad had pulled over and turned off the engine. He sat frozen, hands wrapped around the steering wheel, just listening, until the song came to an end.

The tape stopped abruptly, and the spell cast over his dad faded. “Holy fuck,” his dad breathed.

He turned his face toward Peter, his pale eyes shining with tears. “I need to hear that again. Then I've got a story to tell you.”

The tape began rewinding.

 

“The Weapon (Part II of Fear)” [listen](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNe2vTm7va4)  
by Rush, lyrics by Neil Peart, music by Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson

 _We've got nothing to fear but fear itself._  
_Not pain, not failure, not fatal tragedy._  
_Not the faulty units in this mad machinery._  
_With an iron fist in a velvet glove,_  
_We are sheltered under the gun._  
_That they might climb._  
_Is any killer worth more than his crime?_  
  
_We don't see what they're made of._  
_They shout about love, but when push comes to shove,_  
_They live for the things they're afraid of._  
_And the knowledge that they fear_  
_Is a weapon to be used against them._  
  
_He's not afraid of your judgment._  
_He knows of horrors worse than your hell._  
_He's a little bit afraid of dyin',_  
_But he's a lot more afraid of your lyin'._  
_And the things that he fears_  
_Are a weapon to be used against him..._  



End file.
